


the oceans and decades between us

by geode



Category: Atlantis (UK TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-12
Updated: 2014-12-04
Packaged: 2018-01-04 11:20:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1080407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geode/pseuds/geode
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jason goes home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. august

When Jason opens his eyes, heart pounding, head reeling, his first instinct is to yell _"What the hell?"_ , because there's sand in his hair even though he's in a freshly-made bed in a room that smells of bleach and roses, and there's a blurry figure standing above him, and just a second ago he was _dying_ , they were all _dying_ , and he's still in the moment, yet no—here he is, dry, fine; he doesn't even remember closing his eyes. The figure moves away slightly, looks at the door. Jason blinks, pulse slowing, brain going into overdrive. He can't think for a few moments, and when he goes to speak he just says, _"What the hell?"_ again, and then he realises he'd actually said _"Ti sto kaló?"_ and his mouth goes funny as he tries to remember who he is, where he's supposed to be—

The figure puts a hand on Jason's shoulder and says, "You're okay," and the words wobble in Jason's ears, only sounds for a second, and then—

"No," he answers, and he can't tell if it's understandable, "No no no no no," and halfway through, it changes, and the figure starts responding, shaking his head.

"Yes, Jason, it's alright," he says, incomprehensibly calm.

" _Where are they?_ " Jason screams, because there's no one in the room and there are people in his head and he swears they were there before, they were there, they were there, they were drowning right there with him.

(Sometimes worlds die, and sometimes it only takes a word to kill them.)

"Who?" the person says simply.

Jason stares, gut chained to the bottom of the ocean, and then slowly leans back into the soft pillows, squeezing his eyes shut so hard he sees patterns on his lids and cries and cries and cries, everything he lived for and everyone he died for lying, faded, in the mud of someone else's memories.

It's gone, and then suddenly it never was at all.


	2. february

It’s strange, watching someone die.

It’s like— they’re right there, this person you had dinner with last night, who laughed so much at a joke you made that they spat wine down themselves, whose crow’s feet make you want to get inside their head. You watch them, directionless desperation emanating from your fingers, the fingers you can’t feel from cold, splayed on their forearms. They watch you back, and you see they’re calmer than you are, and you find this jarring. They know. You’re pretending you don’t. You swallow, and cough up salt, and their shoulders are starting to sag now. You say their name, ‘cause you have to say something. Their blinking gets slower, but they’re determined to look back at you, and you don’t want to see what comes next. You grip them, holding them down, even though you’re perfectly aware that the thing that needs holding down is intangible and halfway gone anyway.

And then. And then their eyes go blank, like a wave washing away a love note in the sand. And you can still see them, still make out the crow’s feet, but the person is gone. You have no idea who this— _body_ , belongs to. You curse whoever it is. Their limbs are stiff. You can’t let go, but you can look away. You have no idea whether you do though, as all is bright, bright darkness; blinding nothingness, like the Universe beginning or ending or halting, everything blurring into everything else.

It’s strange, and even if you didn't love them excruciatingly before this moment, you do now, for all they could have become. Now they are perfect, simply because they have been stopped short. Suddenly you remember his courage, his humour, and realise he would've been a hero had he not—Well.

“Pythagoras,” Hercules says, putting his hand over yours over its, this corpse with blood gently slowing in the veins of its wrists. “We must go, otherwise he won’t have saved us at all.”

He’s right, of course, but you understand now that it wasn’t worth it anyway. You don’t really want saving; not after this.


End file.
